Zach Brooks lives in Washington, DC and works at a nonprofit on digital communications. He's a proud Michigan State grad and is usually found cheering on the Spartans at the MSU alumni bar on Capitol Hill. He also cohosts of the Natty Brohs podcast. Favorite actor is Tom Hanks. Favorite movie is Back to the Future 2. Favorite sandwich is the Reuben. Follow Zach on Twitter

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Chapter 62 comments: (I have not watched past 62, so this is all unspoiled speculation)

Macallan’s death: That was totally not a suicide you guys. He was shot in the eye from the front. It would be very awkward to hold a gun at that angle and pull the trigger. Plus his gun was on the bed nowhere near his body. That was Jane straight up murdering a guy. She did the classic thing of letting the prisoner escape (he said something like “I just walked out”) and then following him to see where he goes and whom he contacts. Murdering him in a hotel room also removes their fingerprints from the situation, since he wasn’t in the government’s custody at the time. I thought the shredder at the end made it pretty clear that that was Jane’s doing; why else end on that?

Macallan and Leann: So he sent her an email containing the audio file saying “if you are hearing this then I’m dead”, but the email also contained a link to a document. That document was protected by the three questions. She listened to the audio and then clicked on the link to read the document, and saw the questions. At that point she knew it must really have been sent by him and not a forgery, by the personal nature of the questions. She started crying without answering the questions to read the document, so we don’t know what he sent her. Using “mom” to refer to her mother doesn’t really seem all that off; maybe it would have been more clear if he had said “your mom.” But it had been established that the mom and him were together, maybe even married. They definitely weren’t related. The kiss on the lips was indeed weird, and they might be hinting that something hinky had happened between stepfather and daughter during that period, or maybe after the relationship with the mom ended. Its purpose seems to cast the nature of Leann’s relationship with this guy in a new light, at the time when she is grieving him the most.

Scientist: My interpretation of that was that the Russians had abducted this scientist with specialized knowledge and forced him to work for them. (“They had something they weren’t supposed to have.”) Having him drown during the rescue was probably part of the plan (by Jane, no doubt), because it resolves it in a way that doesn’t force an international incident. If you rescue him and bring him home then he’s probably going to expect to tell the world what happened to him, and that would cause Petrov to retaliate. If you let him continue to work for the Russians then they get the upper hand in the oil situation. Killing him ensures that the Russians can’t benefit but that they also don’t have any basis to feel slighted, maintaining the status quo. Maybe the Russians rather than Jane ensured that he died during the rescue, so that he couldn’t present his story and embarrass Russia. I think this story is done.

Frank’s plan: Come on, this wasn’t intentional. “Okay, Claire, here’s the plan. We’re going to fight tooth and nail to get me elected, including committing potentially career ending shenanigans, and then one week after I’m finally in office we’re going to induce an impeachment hearing so that I can resign and you can take the job.” That’s just not realistic. Frank did not want this, and it was not planned. My read on the Walker conversation was that it wasn’t anything that Frank said specifically, it was that just being in a room with him reminded Walker of what a slimeball Frank was.

Durant: She wanted to prevent the gas attack before it happened (via diplomacy, or UN intervention, or whatever), because she’s not a horrible person. Frank and Claire want to wait for it to happen and then use it as a pretense, because they are garbage people. They know that Durant hates getting involved in their dirty shit, so they tempted her by allowing her to finally resign and be done with this administration if she will play ball this last time and not try to stop the attack.

turgid_legume

Chapter 63 comments (having not seen 64):

Sean Jeffries: Seems pretty obvious to me that Claire hired him. He said that the call came from the vice president’s office, and Claire had been watching him earlier when he was speaking with Grayson trying to get an audience with Claire.

Yates: Claire was trying to scare off Yates by telling him all the bad things that Frank had done. She was hoping that he’d be disgusted and leave on his own so that she wouldn’t have to break up with him. He even says something like, “You can’t scare me.” It wasn’t a sudden turn-around on her part when she finally ended it. I think she’d been trying to end it for a while but was unable until now.

Claire and Frank: All signs point to Claire pushing out Frank, and being the leak. It doesn’t make any sense otherwise.